Song Mingzhen stared at the note for a long time, turning the paper over and over in his hands and examining it. All his efforts to find out something about its sender were to no avail, though— they had been discreet. The use of disappearing ink meant that it had probably been written by a cultivator, but almost all of the people in Baidong Mountain would fit that description. The more he looked at it, the more the handwriting seemed a little familiar— but that didn’t tell him much either. His own memory loss aside, the Qin clan’s toolmakers placed great importance on practicing precise and uniform calligraphy, so that they could accurately write and reproduce the inscriptions they used on their mechanisms. While there was some individual variation, the overall style would be distinct to the family, rather than the individual.
Yet again, his ruminations got him nowhere— and thus, the note’s mysterious sender remained unknown.
The only way for Song Mingzhen to learn their identity was to do as the note instructed.
He wasn’t especially happy about this. It was quite suspicious— he’d only just arrived here, and he’d already received a cryptic message. Either he’d managed to offend someone, or the fugitive Second General thought he was such a dire threat that she wanted to take him out right away.
Or maybe it wasn’t a trap at all.
Maybe there really was someone who wanted to speak to him— and maybe that person had valuable information related to this case.
Still, why Song Mingzhen? He had only shown up today, and he certainly wasn’t the one leading the investigation. Ning Feiyun was out right now, but it wouldn’t be long before he returned. If someone knew more about what happened that night, then shouldn’t they go tell him instead? The more Song Mingzhen thought about it, the more curious he became.
When the appointed time came, he couldn’t help but throw caution to he wind and give in— he wrapped himself up in his cloak and slipped out into the night.
The sender had chosen a discreet method of notifying him, so Song Mingzhen remained discreet in turn, out of courtesy. He kept to the shadows, outside the glow of the crystal lamps, and took great pains to make sure no one followed him and to avoid any of the many nightly patrols.
Baidong Mountain’s west slope was quite gradual, so most of the buildings were located there. The other three sides of the mountain were an assortment of rocky outcroppings, sheer cliffs, and narrow, winding paths. It was a good place to get some peace and quiet, but far less ideal for building or working. Aside from the paths which led into some of the caves, the rest was outside of the regular patrol routes and there wasn’t a crystal lamp to be seen.
Song Mingzhen knew he was taking a risk— going alone to a secluded space in the middle of the night, at the behest of a stranger when there was a murderous evil cultivator on the loose in Yinshan— but he was prepared to handle whatever situation he found.
He thought it best to throw himself into action first, to seize any opportunity that presented itself, and then to deal with the consequences later.
It wasn’t too difficult to come up with plans in the moment, after all.
Especially in this case. After having this trip suddenly sprung upon him, Song Mingzhen would really prefer to just wrap it all up quickly so that he could return home. He had his own matters to worry about there.
He stayed on high alert for any sign of danger as he took smaller and smaller paths to the back of the mountain, the light of the crystal lamps fading away behind him. The note hadn’t given a specific location, so he assumed that he was meant to just wander around a little until he found the meeting place.
It was even colder now than before, and the snow was coming down so hard that Song Mingzhen’s footprints were filled in only a few moments after he left them. The shimmering sound of falling snow filled the air against the background of whistling wind. Despite the darkness and the less-than-ideal conditions, Song Mingzhen didn’t have any trouble navigating the terrain. His spiritual sense was more than sufficient.
He wandered up and down the back of the mountain for awhile, and found it completely barren. There was no sign that anyone had passed this way recently. Though the appointed time had come already, Song Mingzhen was alone. He couldn’t help but feel like it was a little bit eerie. Out here in the middle of the night, knowing the current situation, it was as though he were asking to get himself killed.
Strangely enough, though, Song Mingzhen didn’t feel particularly anxious.
In fact, he felt more comfortable, more at ease now than he had within his own home.
Even though the stronghold of one of the world’s greatest cultivation clans lay just on the other side of the mountain, there was a sense of profound isolation out here beyond the glow of the crystal lamps, amid the driving snow and the shadows that seemed to grow ever-deeper. Song Mingzhen shut his eyes amidst this silence, this solitude, and took in a deep breath of the icy air. It cut at his insides, imprinting the profound whispers of the frost-bearing wind upon his heart.
Earlier today, he stood within Baiyu Palace’s magnificent hall— both sturdy and beautiful, adorned with finery and protected by countless spiritual mechanisms. Somewhere nearby, its precise location kept secret from all but a few, was the most formidable fortress in the cultivation world, a prison that was capable of containing demons.
Yet even these places were not impregnable.
The Song and Qin clans were cultivation families with thousands of years of history, yet a war that lasted three years had decimated them, and a single incident was enough to send them into a state of dread.
Within a great family’s stronghold, there were places of isolation; deep in the wilderness, one could find comfort and companionship. The most bitter enemies would always be able to find one thing to agree upon, and even the strongest friendships could be shattered if seeds of enmity were planted and allowed to grow. Knowing this, one could avoid being blinded by loyalties and deceived by friends.
Every structure had a weak point, every opponent had a blind spot. Within the greatest strength there was weakness, and within the greatest weakness strength. Just like the body’s own meridians, within the world and fate itself there were also acupoints. If one were to cast off their ideas of impossibility and limits and strike at these acupoints, then could they not ultimately overturn even the heavens?
The world may appear to belong to those who held the power the gods had left behind, but were its true masters not the ones who could hide within the blind spots, who could pinpoint those weaknesses?
Song Mingzhen tilted his head up toward the sky. His hood fell back around his shoulders, and the falling snowflakes landed on his face one after another. Where they fell, he felt a slight sting, a prickle of cold that turned to warmth and spread down into his body, harmonizing with the spiritual qi that flowed through his meridians.
In this moment, he felt a clarity that he hadn’t known since he first woke up months ago.
Here on this isolated mountainside, staring up at the falling snow, he felt like a blockage within him had melted away— a blockage that he hadn’t been able to clear, no matter how many hours he spent repeating sword taolu or sitting in meditation.
He hadn’t even realized that his spiritual sense was dulled— suddenly, everything around him became sharper and brighter and clearer than before. The quiet mountainside was no longer so quiet. Song Mingzhen could feel its vast reserves of spiritual qi humming beneath his feet and whistling past his ears.
It also wasn’t so lonely anymore.
Before, he had been searching for a presence, and turned up nothing. Now, though, as his consciousness swept over the mountainside, he realized that he had been searching for the wrong thing— there was a small place where his spiritual gaze could not penetrate! It had gone unnoticed before, but now, with his newly-discovered clarity, it was glaringly obvious. The one who had left the note had been here all along. They’d just been concealing their presence!
Song Mingzhen recalled that embarrassing misunderstanding when he first arrived at Baidong Mountain. He hadn’t noticed the watchmen until they released the spirit-binding net, trapping him and the messenger inside. Back then, he hadn’t been able to feel their presence or know anyone was there until it was far too late. It was lucky that it was just a misunderstanding, and they hadn’t really been under attack— otherwise, they may have ended up injured or killed after being caught unawares.
It was the same situation now.
Only, in this case, his hazy senses had cleared, and he could now see what he had missed before.
There was still one slight problem— though he could tell someone was concealing themselves, he couldn’t discern anything more about them. Even their height and girth were up for debate, as it was possible for the concealment to extend a bit around them, depending on what sort of art was being used. Still, now that he knew where they were, he had a bit of an advantage.
He didn’t want to rush into a fight. For all he knew, this person wasn’t his enemy. Still, he couldn’t let his guard down, and he couldn’t approach directly. There was still a chance that they would run away if they knew they’d been spotted. If nothing else, he needed to know why they had summoned him out here, only to watch him from the shadows for several ke without making a move— and he would never learn if he gave them any chance to escape.
Not to mention, they’d promised a discussion— and Song Mingzhen wanted to see that promise fulfilled.
So, he maintained a sense of calm, and began aimlessly wandering the slopes once again. Only this time, he began to meander toward the concealed stranger in an indirect path, stopping here and there to feign waiting, watching, listening. Now that he knew where that person was and what was happening, there was no harm in giving them one last chance to show themselves willingly.
These attempts seemed to be successful. As far as Song Mingzhen could tell, it didn’t seem like the stranger knew that he’d spotted them, and remained confident in their concealment. Even as he got closer and closer, they didn’t move— neither fleeing nor revealing themselves.
At last, Song Mingzhen decided to give up on waiting.
The other party clearly had no intention of making the first move. He supposed it was up to him now.
Without even a moment of hesitation, and with a speed that a mortal’s gaze could not track, Song Mingzhen leapt toward the place where the stranger was concealed. Chengxiao slid free from its scabbard, bathing the snowy mountainside in golden light. Song Mingzhen formed a sword seal with his hand and sent the blade flying in a wide arc, while he himself spun in the other direction. Both his palm and his sword’s blade stopped a hair’s breadth from the distortion in his spiritual sense.
Got you!
For a few breaths, everything was quiet. Then, the air rippled, and the previously-hidden figure came into view, emerging from concealment.
“Please— I didn’t mean any harm!”
When he heard that soft, light voice and got an actual look at the person, Song Mingzhen’s eyes went wide, and he drew back his sword. It was a young woman with a round face and prettily-painted lips, tightly wrapped in a cloak to shield against the driving snow. Chengxiao’s glow illuminated the startled terror on her features, and she was trembling, though it was difficult to tell if that was from fear or from the cold. She had pulled her hands up against her chest and hunched her shoulders, and if she hadn’t been too terrified to move she would have probably cowered down on the ground.
Chengxiao returned to Song Mingzhen’s side, but he stayed on guard— he wasn’t the sort to simply trust the innocence of a pretty face.
“Why were you standing there watching me?” he asked. “Were you the one who asked me to come here?”
The woman still seemed a bit shaken, but when she saw that she wasn’t in any immediate danger she calmed down a bit. She glanced around briefly, anxiously, as though she feared being followed, and then turned back to Song Mingzhen.
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“I am,” she said, nodding her head. “My name is Yang Anxiang, and I was a concubine of Qin-zongzhu. When I heard that you had coming here to Baidong Mountain, I decided that I simply had to meet with you, no matter what.”
“And why is that?” Song Mingzhen asked.
“That’s because… you don’t come from Yinshan, and you have no connections here,” she said, lowering her voice so that it was barely louder than a whisper. “I’ve heard that you place great importance on the common people’s safety. You just want to find out the truth about what happened, don’t you? Regardless of who may or may not be involved.”
Song Mingzhen didn’t answer right away. The truth…
Well, she wasn’t wrong. He did want to find out what had happened, but from what he had heard, Yinshan’s people generally thought the matter was fairly cut and dry. Obviously, the one who had killed the clan leader was the escaped Second General. The way that this woman spoke, though… she, like Song Mingzhen’s father, seemed to think that there was something more to all of this.
Did Yang Anxiang know who had helped the Second General escape?
Or were there still even more layers to this mystery?
Either way— Song Mingzhen wanted to know the answer. “I do,” he confirmed. “I suppose you know something that could help?”
Yang Anxiang nodded her head. “I know things,” she answered, still cryptically, “How much I can tell you… well, that depends on how much I can trust you. Or how much you would understand.”
“If you know more about Qin-zongzhu’s death…”
“Not only that,” Yang Anxiang hinted, seeming to tuck herself further into her cloak. “One overhears quite a lot of things when they have a habit of listening quietly. I can help you… but I cannot tell you everything just yet. It wouldn’t be safe— for either of us.”
The hair on the back of Song Mingzhen’s neck prickled, and the cold wind suddenly felt just a little more bitter. “Have you been threatened?”
Yang Anxiang hesitated a moment, then shook her head. “No… not in so many words,” she replied. “Nonetheless… if others were to find out what I know, I would be in danger.”
“I see,” Song Mingzhen nodded. It seemed that, even though Yang Anxiang had invited him out here, she wasn’t quite sure whether or not to trust him in these matters. Still… “This information that you have… if withholding it could do more harm, I must insist you tell me immediately.”
“Oh, it isn’t like that!” Yang Anxiang insisted, shaking her head quickly. “It… everything’s already been done. They don’t— I don’t think they have any more plans right now. At least as far as I know.”
“And how far is that?”
“… not all that far, I suppose.”
Song Mingzhen sighed, pressing his thumb into the center of his brow and massaging out an oncoming headache. Yang Anxiang was being so cagey and secretive, teasing him with vague statements but retracting them before he learned anything useful. He’d get nowhere with this sort of roundabout questioning. It would be better to just ask her directly. “Do you know who helped the Second General escape?”
Yang Anxiang startled a bit. Then, she looked down toward the ground, scuffing at the snow with her boots. “I… have some idea of that, Song-gongzi,” she admitted.
“Who is it?”
“I cannot tell you like this,” Yang Anxiang’s brows creased, and her expression turned pleading. “Not right now, not yet.”
“Then why did you ask me to come here?” Song Mingzhen pressed his lips tightly together in frustration.
“Because I needed to at least tell you something! Even if I can’t say now, I’ll reveal everything when the right time comes… I just want you to be careful. Don’t assume you know the truth until everything has come to light, or you’ll risk making the wrong decisions,” She looked back toward the ground, intertwining her fingers together in front of her and hunching her shoulders. “That’s all that I can say… I promise, you’ll understand someday.”
Song Mingzhen was struck dumb as a wooden chicken. That was all? She’d arranged this meeting, slipping out of Baiyu Palace in the middle of the night while a murderer was on the loose, just to give him a few cryptic details and vague warnings before running away?
Something wasn’t right about all of this.
As Yang Anxiang turned to leave, Song Mingzhen reached out and caught her by the wrist. “Wait.”
She flinched, slowly turning but still not fully meeting his gaze. He could feel her shaking in his grasp, and suddenly he felt a bit ashamed.
That’s right… she’d taken a risk coming out here at all. A girl in her position didn’t hold much power in Baidong Mountain, especially now after Qin Wenying’s death, so it was only reasonable that she’d be afraid. If she told Song Mingzhen, and he accidentally shared that information with the true culprit… or if there were more than one person involved, and she wasn’t completely sure of what she’d seen or heard, it could all collapse back onto her head.
There were plenty of reasons that she might want to be cautious and make sure that he was trustworthy before revealing everything.
He should be grateful to have any kind of warning at all— even though he’d already been told to suspect foul play. Besides, there were still some things he could glean from her statements. If nothing else, this at least confirmed that there was more to this case than meets the eye.
“Ah— my apologies,” he said, shaking his head as he let go of her wrist. “Still… you’ve given me very little information, and I have no reason to trust you above anyone else. For all I know, you yourself have some ulterior motive, and are seeking to deter me from discovering the truth. How am I supposed to trust your words?”
Yang Anxiang looked surprised, and then her eyes softened, and a hint of a smirk turned the corners of her mouth upward. She sighed, rubbing slightly at her wrist. “Gongzi is clever… just as I hoped. I will leave it to you to decide whether or not to trust me. My only goal is that the true nature of these matters ultimately comes to light. Now… I must return to Baiyu Palace before anyone notices I’ve left. If there is anything more I must speak to you about, I will contact you the same way as before, and we will meet here again. Next time… I won’t hide for so long, alright?”
There wasn’t anything Song Mingzhen would gain through holding her hostage or interrogating her— after all, he was a guest here in Baidong Mountain, and such behavior surely wouldn’t endear him to his hosts. As for Yang Anxiang’s motives… well, there seemed to me more to that than meets the eye, but Song Mingzhen couldn’t put his finger on exactly what. She must have a reason for concealing what she knew. Whether it was because she’d been threatened… or because she was directly involved somehow, he didn’t know.
But wouldn’t it ultimately be easier to find out if she thought he was on her side?
“Very well,” he said at last. “I only hope that you’re right— and that the perpetrators don’t get the chance to cause any more harm because of your secrecy.”
Yang Anxiang lowered her gaze. “Thank you for understanding, Gongzi.”
She dipped her head, then turned away again, heading back toward one of the narrow, winding paths. Song Mingzhen hesitated for a moment, then called out once more: “You shouldn’t be wandering alone at night. Especially now, when there is an evil cultivator roaming free. Allow me to accompany you back to Baiyu Palace, so that I can ensure your safety.”
He hoped she would accept. The more time he spent in her company, the more chances he would have to get her to lower her guard, and the more she might let slip.
Yang Anxiang stopped in place. Beneath the whistling of the wind, Song Mingzhen thought he heard a light, soft laugh, like the peal of a distant bell. She turned her head and met his gaze once more— now, it looked like there was some kind of bitterness in her eyes.
“I assure you, Gongzi, I am in no more danger out here than within the walls of Baiyu Palace,” she said. Then, as if to demonstrate, she gave a flourish of her wrist, producing a talisman that went off with a brief flash of light. Then, she vanished, concealing herself beneath the mountain’s rippling spiritual qi just like before.
Song Mingzhen caught the briefest glimpse of a disruption in his spiritual sense, but by the time he focused in on it, she was already gone. When he swept his gaze across the mountainside, there was no more sign of her at all. He was left well and truly alone, with only the snow and the wind for companions, and a slight impression of footprints in the snow to say she had ever been there at all.
How strange…
This Yang Anxiang was full of contradictions. She wasn’t bothering to hide that she was an accomplished cultivator in her own right, while still playing the part of the helpless maiden. Song Mingzhen stood for awhile on the mountainside, contemplating as her footprints were covered over in fresh snow, before he made his way back to his lodgings.
The Yang clan were one of the great cultivation clans, medicine-makers and alchemists from Xuanlin to the east. Qin Wenying’s principal wife was a woman from a subsidiary clan— Song Mingzhen couldn’t help but wonder how the Yang family had agreed to allow one of their daughters to become his concubine, especially when Yang Anxiang seemed to be quite capable. Even if she were only a distant relative of the main family, wouldn’t that still be too disgraceful? Besides that, with her hinting at danger within the palace walls… all these threads were tangled up far too tightly, and Song Mingzhen— a man to whom the matters of marriage and family alliances held very little interest— found it difficult to begin to unravel them.
In the end, he had to take a moment to be grateful that his father hadn’t brought up the subject yet. If he had to navigate this sort of mess for himself, Song Mingzhen surely would go mad.
Whatever the situation was, he needed to learn more about Yang Anxiang in order to make a proper judgement on her character. There was something strange behind that smile of hers, a secret hidden out in the open, but no more easily uncovered than if it had been fully buried.
Song Mingzhen found his guest lodgings undisturbed when he returned, and for that he was grateful. He turned in for the night without much fanfare, and lay awake for a while, staring up at the ceiling as he tried to piece together any new conclusions from the information he had learned today.
He still didn’t know enough.
There were his father’s suspicions about Ning Feiyun, and Yang Anxiang’s confirmation that there was more to this than a simple escape and assassination. He remembered how she told him not to jump to conclusions, though— and stopped short of linking the two together in his mind.
That kind of thinking would only create blind spots, through which the true culprit could escape. Besides, it wasn’t as though Yang Anxiang herself was perfectly cleared of suspicion. Her behavior was quite odd. It was clear that she wanted him to dig deeper, but why? What could she have to gain here?
Song Mingzhen still needed to gather more information. He shut his eyes, inhaling deeply, then exhaling with a huff. Just how many secrets did Baidong Mountain hold?
And why was he the one who had to unravel them?
Didn’t that seem a bit unfair?
For now, there was nothing he could do about it— he could only wait for Ning Feiyun to return and the search to begin in earnest. Then, he could either find grounds for his father’s suspicions or lay them to rest— and perhaps once the matter of Ning Feiyun was settled, Yang Anxiang’s side of the story would become easier to parse.
Perhaps Ning Feiyun would even be able to tell him more about her.
With some effort, Song Mingzhen put aside all of this and tried to get some rest— but he found that sleep was unwilling to come for him. He was more agitated now than before, and his consciousness was restless. He entered meditation, focusing in on the beating of his own heart and driving out the rest of the world’s noise.
After a long time like this, he finally drifted off.
But his sleep was not a peaceful one.
Within his slumber, he heard faint, distant voices, murmuring to one another in unintelligible speech. As he surfaced amid a dream, Song Mingzhen found himself wandering through dark passages, enclosed in stone on all sides as he tried to find the source of those voices. In the distance, there were faint sounds of battle, and the stench of blood pervaded his senses.
“…current position, you owe it to me.”
The hazy voice within his dream suddenly became clear, and Song Mingzhen felt chilled to the depths of his soul. It was almost indistinguishable from his own, but it spoke in a way that was unlike himself— cold and biting as the edge of a steel blade. Song Mingzhen tried to follow the sounds, and saw two figures standing in the distance— but a black mist had risen up from the ground, blocking their faces from view.
“Now, it’s time for you to repay that debt.”
Song Mingzhen couldn’t tell who was speaking. A moment later, the two figures turned away, disappearing into another cavern. Song Mingzhen tried to catch up, but it felt like he was stuck in a dense mire, his movements painfully slow.
By the time he reached the cavern, the pair had vanished. Instead, an ominous red light reflected off a smooth, glistening surface in the depths of the cave.
It was a mirror, as tall as Song Mingzhen himself. Within it, he saw his own reflection, standing with his hands pressed against the glass.
A shudder ran through Song Mingzhen’s body— this uncanny image, this ominous feeling, it reminded him of that brief vision he had seen before collapsing in his room. Only now, there was no denying what he saw.
Helpless to resist, his steps were drawn inward until he stood face to face with the mirror image of himself, his own hands coming to rest palm-to-palm with his reflection. There was something off about the reflection’s appearance— the shape of his nose, the curve of his brows, the lines on the palms, everything was just the slightest bit different from his own, like it had been twisted up and distorted. The reflection in the mirror met his gaze, its expression unreadable, a silent, unknown plea in its eyes.
The lotus blossoms in a pool of blood, unaware that it is nourished by suffering.
Song Mingzhen found himself leaning forward as his hands started to sink into the mirror. He tried to pull himself back, but it was too late— he had already fallen too far in. The reflection before him rippled and shifted, crimson blood dripping from his face’s seven apertures.
All support gave way, and Song Mingzhen plunged into the mirror’s surface, merging with the reflection. The taste of blood filled his mouth, and he felt himself falling down, down, down, until he landed with a splash in a deep pool, his body numb and his mind spinning. Bright, brilliant light surged up around him, blinding him and overwhelming his senses.
The senses perceive that which the mind believes, but the mountain’s heart recalls the truth.
Countless unfamiliar voices and faces swirled through Song Mingzhen’s consciousness, pain blossoming forth deep within his heart and spreading through his body, paralyzing him so that he could do nothing but sink deeper and deeper. The surface was far beyond his reach, and there was no bottom to this pool, only an endless blackness beneath. The water filled his lungs, entering his veins and flowing through his body.
Then, just as he was about to drown, he awoke from the dream with a start.